


A Letter to My Distant Heart

by watsonswarrior



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drama, M/M, Violence/Gore, WWI AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-10
Updated: 2012-02-10
Packaged: 2017-10-30 22:19:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/336772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/watsonswarrior/pseuds/watsonswarrior
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During WWI, John, immersed in deep trench warfare, writes a letter home to Sherlock</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Letter to My Distant Heart

12 December 1915 

Dear Sherlock,

I've lost count of how long I’ve been stuck down here. Trapped, is more like it. I feel as if I’m in a prison, the walls that surround me made of crumbling dirt and mud. Our barracks, if you could even call them that, are falling apart. The wooden oak is sodden, destroyed by the torrential downpour that starts as sudden as anything. You blink, turn your head, pick a flea from your damp sleeve for the slightest second, and you’re pelted by the bone-chilling ice rain. In the summer, it’s a balm to our burning skin, yet in the colder season, as it is now, it’s complete and utter torture. 

There is never an escape, nor a trapdoor you can shimmy out to flee from the buckets upon buckets of rain that never seem to cease. I am never dry. My uniform sticks to my cold shivering body. On the really bad days, I can feel my lips turn blue and my fingers cramp and I fear I will not be able to bend them. I try with all my might; I will them to budge, just one centimeter, but to no avail.

After grueling, agonizing seconds that feel like minutes, hours even, I am able to furl and unfurl my palsy ridden hands. I do not remember the last time I felt sunlight. That is one of the things I miss most of all: the feeling of stretching out like an idle cat, lapping up the sweet, warm rays of the glorious sun. Nothing could have prepared me for this constant rain. Even back home, where the rain fell at a steady pace, I would always have my tea and, of course, you. You would always lighten up my day, no matter how dreary it seemed outside. That’s the only thing keeping me going in this godforsaken place. The thought of you laid out languidly on the sofa, long, slender fingers steepled underneath your smooth, alabaster chin. 

I miss seeing your eyebrows scrunched in concentration, your ever changing eyes gleaming with delight. Sometimes I think about our lazy Sundays, the breakfasts we’d have at the dining room table, the early morning light shining through the threadbare curtains. I miss making tea first thing in the morning, the calming, even cathartic, routine of taking out the mug, putting the kettle on, placing the tea bag in the cup, and pouring in the steaming water. As I’d rub my bleary eyes, I would see you in your navy blue bathrobe and I’d smile because you were real. This hell I’m living in, this just cannot be.

So many times I would think living here, in the trenches, was all just some nightmare spun up by the darkest recesses of my mind. Any moment I would wake up and see the light stream in, turning your raven black curls into a glowing halo. But each day I wake up in the same damn place, the cold dank slowly turning my bones to stone. The soldiers around me are worse off. They look like breathing corpses. The light from their eyes has diminished. I suspect if there was a barrage of bombs or whizzing bullets, they would go without a fight. They may even shield the new recruits. I feel a sharp pang in my heart whenever a new batch of soldiers enters our regiment. Their faces, they are so incredibly young. I want to cry out, shake their thin adolescent bodies, and ask them why they would condemn themselves to such a fate. The fresh, innocent, naïve expressions on their angular faces make my soul wither. 

They have absolutely no idea what they signed themselves into. There is nothing to do but try to comfort them, make them feel as if they are among friends. The older, more war-wearied soldiers welcome them under their wing; give them someone to confide in. They are better men than they give themselves credit for. However, the men are careful about not getting too attached to the others. Any one of them could drop dead at any given time. Not too long ago, a fellow soldier, no older than seventeen for god’s sake, was hit by a flying piece of shrapnel in the stomach. He cried out, face contorting in pain and agony. There was no alleviating the anguish felt by this poor kid. A few of us gathered round the thin, oh so thin, body and tried to do anything to save him. 

He cried out for his mother. We turned our heads down as the boy’s shouts escalated. As you know, I possess keen medical knowledge, so I leaned over to get a closer look at the soldier. He was going into fits of convulsion, foam frothing at his dry, near white lips. His skin turned sallow and waxy, the deep purple bruises under his eyes harshly juxtaposing his wan complexion His dark hair was matted down, and whether it was due to his cold sweat or the moisture from the sky, I was not sure. The boy’s eyes were already clouded over, a glassy film covering his pale eyes. They were a warm, emerald green.

My gaze sank lower, past his bony shoulders, his protruding collarbone, past his shaking torso, until finally my eyes were focused on the glaring metal sticking out of his thin stomach. It was lodged in, blood pooling on the thick mud. If I were to take out the shrapnel, the boy would have gone into shock and be in even more pain. There was nothing to be done. A complete and utter feeling of helplessness washed over me. I could not save this boy, the young man who lied about his age in order to feel the splendor, the honor of serving his country. He has family, friends, a dame, a bloke, someone who will mourn his passing, who will feel the bitter sting of remorse when they find out he won’t be coming back alive. 

I bit back the tears that threatened to spill over. The war seems so far away, so incredibly distant. I took hold of his hand, since this was the only thing I could think of doing. I held it tight, looking into his glassy eyes and trying to be there for him in his last moments. I wanted to hold and rock him in my arms, but there was hardly enough room for it. So I gripped his moist hand harder still, waiting, forever waiting, until the light finally flickered out of those green eyes. The tears mingled with the rain overhead as I reached over and shut his eyelids. I didn’t even know his name.

What has this world come to? There are mere children dying right beside me. How many more have to die to justify this war we’re fighting? Three hundred, five hundred, six thousand? When will enough be enough? In the thick of night, when everyone thinks everyone else is fast asleep, I hear the groans of my fellow soldiers emptying their bowels, their stomachs, everything into the soupy dirt. Everyone is sick. Health is merely a long gone memory. And comfort? On bad days I can’t even imagine people living with roofs over their heads and warm beds to crawl into after a perfectly ordinary day at their run-of-the-mill jobs. 

It’s getting to be harder and harder for me to think of home, to think of the good times we shared, to think of your angelic features. I want to weep when I fail to grasp the image of a simple day of us walking the streets, going to the park, reading, lounging, all the while with our hands clasped so tight. I long for our sense of stability and normality. I am sick of seeing men drop like flies due to the cocktail of disease cooking in these trenches, these men that I have to be around every second of every day with. And I hate myself for getting close to them.

They open up and I lend an ear and before I know it we’re swapping stories of our lives before the war and we laugh and become close friends. I loathe myself for it. I’ve tried to put on a cold front, but all of us are so lonely already. There’s that basic human need for companionship, no matter what the situation may be. Sometimes, we all need a friend. If only it could be anywhere but here. The closer I find myself getting to the other men, the more heartbreaking their death is. I’ve lost count of how many hands I’ve had to hold while their soul slowly left their body. Maybe I’ll learn to stop looking into their eyes. It’s always the same, no matter the person. They are all so scared, terrified. Some cry out for their families, others whimper. 

There are those select few that take hours to die. So, I talk to them. I try to ease their passing. I tell them about my schooling and my family, I even tell them about you. I tell them about our cozy little place and our delightful memories, I hope you don’t mind. These men, during that time of complete horror, I think they need something good to hold onto. There is no goodness down here in the trenches. When I talk about us, they always manage a shaky smile. That’s the only reward I get: to have the ability to make them smile while they leave this life.

I don’t know why I’m writing you this letter. Why would you ask that from me? That I give all the details to show you everything through my writing, to make sure I don’t cut any corners? I feel as if I’m burdening you with this account, this real account of life down here. But you want me to write everything, to tell you all the details, and that’s what I love about you. I know this is as selfish as anything, but I have to tell someone, and I wouldn’t be able to keep this from you. It was a relief when you assured me that you could handle it, that no matter how gruesome it got, you wanted every single thing running through my head because that’s no less than what you wanted from me back home. You would always ask me about my day and have me regale every detail back to you.

Yes, I would always huff and roll my eyes, but god do I miss that. Your persistent questioning, your intent waiting until I finally give you the information you want. Those things I would take for granted, and I hate myself even more now for doing so. How could I ever take anything about you for granted? I got too used to having your face being the last thing I saw before I went to sleep and the first thing I saw when I woke up and now I’m paying the price. The only solace I have left in this hellhole is that the nights are, for the most part, clear. It may rain for hours on end, but when the sky transitions into the deep midnight blue of night, I can see the stars. Do you remember the time we went for a night stroll and you commented on how beautiful those stars were? I was shocked. I didn’t think you were capable of seeing the beauty in such things, but your voice, colored with unmistakable awe, shot an arrow straight into my heart and that’s when I knew. That’s when I finally realized I was so deeply in love with you. So I look up at the night sky and think of your velvety voice and your iridescent eyes, those sharp cheekbones, and suddenly I’m home with you.

Forever yours,

John


End file.
